Did HRC Drive Off with the NOM Defector's Marriage Equality Tour?

Did HRC steal the name or idea for their bus tour from the NOM defector, or is it a coincidence?

Last week, we broke the story that Kitty Lambert, one of the very first lesbians legally married in New York State, would be joining NOM defector Louis Marinelli, once a staunch opponent of gay marriage, on a national marriage equality bus tour.

"got on a conference call with Arisha Hatch and Rick Jacobs of the Courage Campaign to float my idea of doing the tour and to get them to participate. Both Rick and Arisha thought the idea was great and they were excited to be on board and work on the project together. But Mr. Jacobs indicated that he didn't have the power to give the green light to the project himself, or else he would. He had to check in with the chain of command.

"A month later, I hadn't heard back from anybody and I started making calls to the Courage Campaign office from Russia to check in. Each time I was told that Mr. Jacobs was in a meeting or somehow unavailable. I left messages which were never returned."

For their part, the Courage Campaign's Arisha Hatch tells the Voice that, after an initial skepticism the first time Marinelli contacted, she's had "nothing but good things to say about Louis" and believes that "for him to do what he's doing take a lot of courage." She says that, while the Courage Campaign was not interested in going on the entire tour with him, they were interested in possibly doing some events together at certain stops. The Courage Campagin and Marinelli exchanged messages as recently as the end of last week about possibly working together.

However, it may all be for naught. Even though Marinelli had moved forward to start his tour in San Diego, and had even gotten Kitty Lambert to join him, HRC took the wind out of his sails by announcing their tour, launching the same week.

Responding to an inquiry, HRC's Michael Cole-Schwartz wrote to the Voice that:

"[W]e've been planning the HRC bus tour for quite a while and that timing of our release had nothing to do with any external groups or individuals. It was driven by our national poll being completed and the imperative that we begin marketing the events around the tour in the individual cities. Our 'On the Road to Equality tour is an HRC event and the only affiliations it has are with state and local organizations we're working with at individual stops. We haven't coordinated anything with Louis Marinelli or his group, nor is our tour connected with the Courage Campaign."

The Courage Campaign confirmed that they got a heads up about the HRC tour shortly before their announcement, but played no role in it.

Marinelli says his "Road to Equality" graphic, here behind text, came first

"By the way, nice name for the tour, HRC. 'The Road to Equality' has a nice ring to it and if you need a good graphic for promoting the tour, I put one on the NOME website a week or so ago to promote my marriage equality tour. See the big slide graphic for the equality tour where the flags of each state we intend to visit are? Well, right above that is where you'll see the green highway signs on one of which is written 'Road to Equality'. I spent a lot of time on that in Photoshop but [you] can take that, too, if you need it."

The big problem for him, Marinelli says, is not that HRC is also doing a tour, but that it may kill his. Funding sources he was relying on, he says, don't seem to feel the need to sponsor his tour when the well-oiled machine that is HRC is doing the same thing. He even admits:

"I understand the HRC has the manpower, resources, reputation and ability to do their tour and do it well. I won't even contend the fact that they're tour will likely draw more media attention and more people will likely attend their events and sign up for their newsletter and give their credit card information to a young man or woman walking around with a clipboard soliciting donations. Hey, you need money to get the job done and I fully understand that."

Still, as a self described "conservative Republican supporting marriage equality," who had done the same tour the year before for the other side, he knows hitting the road with Kitty Lambert would have given a perspective never heard before, which might have had a better chance of changing people's minds across America than when the HRC bus rides into town.

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Louis said he was a non-profit although the IRS and Delaware had no record of his 501c then he asked Marriage Equality to use their 501c they said NO and he was even asked to remove their logo from his website. I am glad the HRC is getting involved (although not my first choice) they are better than a con-artist.

Marinelli is a homophobe.Ask him what he thinks of gay people, he is a wreck. He does not support full gay inclusion, thinks gay s can change BUT if we exist he is for marriage.He is a walking bus wreck and his unfunded tour will be a total flop. He thinks he is the community's MLK.Good luck.

Republicans don't care at all what HRC has to say. I know. i'm a gay elected republican working within my party to effect change - and it is working. HRC will only alienate more people on it's pro-Obama bus tour.

And just ow is that going for you? Don't see much movement in your party! GOP BLAG is still arguing that gays are bad and DOMA is good, your potential presidential candidates all want a constitutional marriage ban for us, I don't see GOP House pushing for workplace equality. So what did I miss little mouse in the big house, teeny weeny cog in the GOP Oppression Regime man

The article fails to mention that Mr. Marinelli returned to the USA with his girlfriend, so that he could show her the USA without cost to him, he announced his bus tour as a veil to vacation with her using any money collected.

"At this point, things get a little fuzzy about how two tours wound up launching on the same date." you forgot to mention that Greyhound Bus also announced around the same time t hat they were to Open New Sacramento Terminal in July; The sleek, modern terminal is silver LEED-certified and designed to be more efficient for bus service and provide better passenger accommodations. Surely they should have contacted Marinelli and informed him? ! http://www.greyhound.com/en/Ne...

This sounds more like sour grapes from the enNOM bus driver who wasn't hired to drive an Equality bus.

I couldn't fathom what this article was trying to imply until it became clear: They don't trust Marinelli, it seems. Well, that't understandable. The psychology of all this is so clear, at least to me: This minority is maligned by everyone from the pope to congresspersons *and no one puts a stop to it*. No one DEMANDS that the pope stop saying those hateful things, or that he step down, or that those congresspersons be removed from office. Think about it: It is implicitly sanctioned, and this group has to fight for itself half the time. Who stands up for gay people, and I mean *really* stands up for them, vociferously and nationally and nonstop? When anonymous finally started battling Phelpses, note that in all their vitriol against that group, there was never one shred of a mention of gay people. And so on and so on. It's no wonder the pro-gay are exceedingly suspicious of others. Mr. Marinelli has to understand that in their minds -- and they'll never admit this, they'd publicly deny, deny, deny -- he will NEVER be fully 100% forgiven for having dared to stand on the side of hatred when, in the mind of a gay or pro-gay person, there was never any excuse in the world to do that. At the very least, it will take years of his actions to prove his opposition to hatred before he is forgiven. I am not sure the average member of the public understands what incredible divisiveness and hatred is created by the anti-gay, but it's about time the nation understood, and put a stop to it.